What’s been your experience of writers’ residential courses? I’ve heard many good things from friends who’ve done an Arvon course or similar. The idea of a few days holed up in seclusion with time and space to focus on writing does seem like a wonderful luxury. I created my own ‘retreat’ a couple of yearsRead more ⟶
Category: Workshopping
Submissions: this week’s yays and nays
Oh OK I might as well admit it – there are no new YAYs to report. But issue 62 of ‘Obsessed with Pipework’ arrived, including my poem ‘Calamity’ which just crept in at the back. It’s a bit of a weird one (the poem that is) and I’m grateful that Charles Johnson at ‘Obsessed’ hasRead more ⟶
Notes from a workshop
Last week I was lacking inspiration, part due to work commitments and then a 3-day headache – ugh – so it was a pleasure to once more find myself in the interesting ambience of the Lewes Bus Station building for another workshop with Mimi Khalvati and the group of serious poets I seem to haveRead more ⟶
Super excited
… to actually make it onto a prizewinners list (The New Writer Poetry Prize 2012). The poem in question was one that had been through eight drafts over several months, and I’d workshopped it with two different groups. The content and form changed considerably as I yo-yo-ed back and forth. I’m quite keen to doRead more ⟶
Every Stanza meeting is different
I turned up to yesterday’s Brighton Poetry Stanza meeting with pretty much a clean sheet regarding how we’d spend the time. Although it was scheduled as a poetry reading and/or workshopping group, everyone was actually wanting to workshop their own poems. So pretty straightforward, and virtually no facilitation required from me at all. Except itRead more ⟶
Forthcoming events
Last week I wasn’t able to get along to the first Pighog poetry night in Brighton as it was Nick’s birthday so we ate out at the Jolly Sportsman in East Chiltington (lush). BUT I’m looking forward to the next one on March 28th as Judith Cair, a lovely poet who I know from variousRead more ⟶
Notes from Mimi Khalvati workshop
Yesterday was the first of our monthly workshops with Mimi Khaltvati this year, and as usual I came away with plenty of new insights and reminders. Here are some of the things Mimi said which I jotted down, as usual I’ve tried to stick to ‘universal’ comments rather than those to do with specific poems.Read more ⟶
How to tackle the “What does it mean?” question
“Poems need room for the imagination to engage” says Roselle Angwin in a interesting blog post on creating ambiguity in a poem, not telling the whole story. So here’s a problem I have, and I can’t be the only one! When I take a poem to a workshopping group I really don’t like explaining. Anything.Read more ⟶
Poetry reading on January 17th
The workshopping group that I go to in Brighton is holding an event, Ten Voice Stanza, on Thursday 17th January. If you are anywhere in the vicinity, please come – and tell your friends! There are ten of us reading and we each have a maximum of 8 minutes, to allow some time for openRead more ⟶
Brendan Cleary workshop – drafting poems
Yesterday I was in Brighton at the Pub with No Name (which is incidentally in an area with a pub on each street corner as well as halfway down each street, so not having a name is pretty cocky) for an all-day workshop with legendary Irish poet Brendan Cleary. (Brendan is editor of the recently relaunchedRead more ⟶